The Story of a Lefty Arcade Stick User

Newbie Saikyo Dojo
1

I am a very old school street fighter player. I grew up playing original SF2 ever since the game came out. I lurked alt.games.sf2, and I played mainly at Tilt in Foster City’s Fashion Island Mall, but then went to college and played at the UC Berkeley Bearcade while at school and at a small arcade on Bowers and El Camino during the summers. Later, I played at MIT’s arcade during the ST and Alpha years.

Since day one, I had to play cross-handed, “Seth Killian” style. I know it looks totally crazy, for those of you who wonder why a right handed person would possibly do this, here is my reasoning:

I am right handed, therefore I am more coordinated with my right hand. What is harder, pushing buttons or doing uppercut motions? It’s a bit more complicated now with the 1-frame links, kara cancelling, 2-button throws and focus attacks, but back in the day, the button pressing was pretty simple and basic, and I needed more coordination for the uppercuts.

It’s a pretty tough road for us “lefty” players. There are basically no options for us besides playing cross handed or buying/building a customer controller. And on top of that, it typically costs more to build these special lefty custom sticks. It is kind of funny to call myself a lefty player because I am very much right handed, but given the default state of joysticks and buttons, that’s the way people view us. I wonder if people who use the standard layout for Street Fighter ever feel funny using a flight stick in the right hand for flying games. Part of it might be that I was just used to the joystick being in the right hand from my Atari 2600 playing days.

So what do people who want joysticks on the right do? I hope this will be a resource for people like me who are looking to hold the joystick the “right” way. :slight_smile: Luckily, I am an electrical engineer, so the modding process seemed like a fun project that didn’t seem too difficult. I was right that it wasn’t too difficult, but it was really time consuming.

I have:
1 MAS System stick, dual modded. But this is a standard (joystick-on-left) layout.
1 Norris Arcade Stick, lefty layout (joystick on right)
1 Voltech Aracde Stick, lefty layout (joystick on right)
1 MadCatz TE “S” Stick, standard layout, but a new panel is on order.

I liked the MAS stick, but it had a standard layout, and I was getting really tired crossing my hands and sitting down (I am used to standing up in the arcades). Also, it had an american stick, and I wanted a japanese style stick, so I went searching for custom cases.

The guys at Norris Arcade Sticks were really nice and had a guy that backed out on a southpaw version, so I snapped it up. It was a ton of work, but it worked. The only things I didn’t like were that it was only 6-button (vs. 8), and I prefer a modified viewlix style layout, and it had a Blast City layout. So I looked for another solution.

I built a Voltech Arcade Stick with a perfect layout (joystick on the right). It’s the stick I use the most right now and is my favorite, and my Norris is a backup. There are some things that I haven’t gotten around to doing, such as adding PS3 support and doing the RJ-45 mod. My solution for headset is also not very pretty, but it is workable.

However, I got the itch for another stick, and I really liked the TE “S” sticks. So my current project is to take a MadCatz TE “S” stick and replace the panel with a custom panel from Art’s Hobbies (Welcome to Art’s Hobbies).

The stick arrived yesterday but I’m still waiting on the panel. In theory, with the custom panel builder, everything should work out, but I had to be careful to avoid some of the obstructions inside the box.

I must say that it was a bit weird, having played 15 years of Street Fighter cross handed and then all of a sudden, to be able to play naturally with the joystick in
the right hand. It was a big relief and basically the only minorly difficult thing to overcome was to switch the button order. What I mean is when you play cross handed, your index finger ends up going on Fierce, and your ring finger ends up on Jab. When I built a “lefty” stick, I did a mirror image flip, so I had to get used to having jab on my index finger (which is natural anyway, since I can jab faster with my index finger anyway).

Anyway, I just wanted to share my experiences, and hopefully help out any people out there who like having the joystick in the right hand.

2

To me it seems like being left handed would be an advantage. The dexterity requirements are higher for the stick than the buttons. Never made much sense to me that left handers reversed the layout of their controllers.

3

I’m left handed…but I don’t play cross-handed.

4

Yeah, what I’m trying to say is that the default layout should be for lefties. I am right handed and would expect that the layout would typically be reversed. But when talking to custom arcade stick makers, I just call it a “lefty” stick and they know what I want.

5

I addressed this problem in detail in this thread: http://shoryuken.com/f322/left-hand-training-worth-while-243077/

6

i feel ya. i’m left handed too but i’ve played right handed and i’ve always wondered how my execution would be if i had a proper lefty stick.

7

AkumaX, do you play on a Playstaion or Xbox 360 pad cross handed? The general concesus in society is that most people ‘main’ their right hand over their left. Yet the majority of controllers and joysticks are ‘catered to lefties’, but you rarely see any complaints about this. I mean I myself write, eat, sleep on, rest on, wack off etc. with my right hand, but I am perfectly comfortable with my standard HRAP layout with the joystick on the Left.

8

Pad - left for movement, right for buttons
Stick - left for movement, right for buttons
Keyboard+Mouse - left for wasd movement, right for buttons and aim
It’s the norm for most input devices imo.

I’m right handed and never had any problems with the layout. In fact, the reverse layout would probably feel really weird (imagining using a reverse stick or pad makes my head hurt).
And like you say, with links and plinking and kara and piano and shit like that the right hand is doing way harder stuff than the left anyway. And let’s not forget three buttons at the same time for ultra.

But that’s just me, people are just different like that about how they use their hands. Some people will be right handed with some activites but lefties with others etc.

9

I’m left handed and the only time I’ve ever really had trouble was doing shoshosho and ptf’s on P2 side. but I got over that with practice.

10

I just bought a used MadCatz TE round 2 from ebay and I would like to make it ‘left-handed’. After trying some of the challenge trials cross handed, I think I would be better with the joystick in my right hand. I’m a beginner and I thought I would get used to a fightstick right away rather than get accustomed to the gamepad. But I’m taking that logic one step further in getting used to the joystick on the right hand side. I was wondering if you were successful in modifying your MadCatz TE “S” Stick. I checked out Art’s Hobbies and I think I am going to try the same avenue. I’m interested in the details of how you created the custom design panel and how installation went. I’m think I’m going to make it a mirror image with the light punch and kick on the inside.

11

I’d like to learn playing cross handed for the cool factor

Ther was an Eddy player who played cross handed, very awesome to watch.

12

Yeah, I am left handed and always thought it was strange that the default layout is easier for lefties. Same with guitars…why does a mostly right-handed world use equipment where all the dexterous activity is done with the left hand? Not that I’m complaining, it just seems odd. I’ve tried reverse controller set ups and lefty guitars but they just feel awkward.

13

I found out the hard way that getting a custom panel made from art’s hobbies isn’t as straightforward as I had hoped. If you look at the inside panel on the TE there is a square below the joystick and there are 8 circles cut out underneath the buttons. Well I had thought those holes were so that you could access the parts from the bottom, and that appears to be the case for the buttons. But with the joystick I was just short a little room on the right side and it was hitting the inside frame. So I had to cut a hole into my inside frame to make it work. So you can still do it but you have to cut a hole in your inside frame. I just posted a picture in the sticky of the tech forum if you want to see it.

14

Since this talks about sticks, I suggest moving this to Tech Talk.

15

First of all, sorry guys, when I started this thread, I didn’t intend it to be solely about Tech. I agree that this might belong in the Tech section.

I just wanted to update everyone – I encountered the same problem you did. I had to dremel the plastic below the joystick to give room for the wires and connectors below the joystick. But it’s working now and I love it! I’ll upload some pics later.

16

HA! Finally meeting someone who use a reverse layout for stick and buttons!
I think as players we don’t really have to care for the norms, I basically can’t time the buttons right with the right hand. My right hand has too much wrist movement and my left is too stiff.

17

There was an old theory tossed out that arcade games started off with the stick on the left, buttons on the right in order to be deliberately harder to control so that the owners would get more money.

18

^that sounds interesting.

19

damn this is very interesting read and happy there are other leftys out there as players like myself. been playing street fighter since snes verison then moved onto genesis and playstation verisons of the game as well as II, II Turbo and the Alpha series which is my favorite street fighter series kinda fell outta touch when Street Fighter III came out but played the Vs series

20

finally, a conspiracy theory worth believing!
also,
http://shoryuken.com/f2/any-southpaw-left-handed-players-out-there-268338/